Ronin
by Nirvash5
Summary: In a world where all Naruto has known is loneliness, will finding a kindred spirit and receiving one of six mystical armors be enough to keep him from being lost to the void of loneliness forever. AU. Naruto/Koyuki. Hiatus. See profile for reason.
1. Pulled From the Void

**DISCLAIMER: If you think I own Naruto, you might be an idiot.**

Ronin

Pulled from the Void

Kazahana Koyuki had retired to her room shortly after dinner with the team of Konoha ninjas that saved her home country from the grips of tyranny at the hands of her corrupt uncle.

She had excused herself on the basis of being exhausted which actually held some truth, now that she thought about it, but the real reason was a blond haired Genin from Konoha.

Ever since he had killed her wayward uncle, she had been getting strange feelings around him.

She honestly did not know what these feelings were.

She had, after all, locked most of her emotions up to cope with the way her father died and her subsequent departure from her country to save her life.

A lot of nights when she was hiding as an actress were spent laying awake wishing that whoever had taken her out of the country had let her stay and be killed.

And over the course of her involuntary exile, she let her heart weep while keeping up a cold exterior and eventually it froze the tears her heart wept and encased it in, what she thought, an impenetrable barrier of ice.

But, since being drug back to her homeland to shoot her newest movie by the team from Konoha, Naruto had been chipping away at the ice that had formed around her heart.

The Ice had started to crack when he risked life and limb to make sure she was safe even when she tried to run away.

A huge chunk of the ice was chipped away when he gave her an inspiring speech about never giving up right before using his teeth and a file to escape the prison he was put in and eventually helped her escape from her own confines.

And by the time it came for him to fight her uncle, she felt the ice around her heart about on the verge of collapsing and she decided to believe in him and tore the rest down herself.

Ever since she had not been able to be around him without getting the same odd feelings as earlier and she idly wondered what it could be.

She felt as if when he was near all her problems were insignificant and that he understood her better than she even understood herself.

What really confused her was why he always closed his eyes when someone tried to look into them. As it was, she had only gotten a few glimpses at his eyes but those precious few times had been enough.

The few times she had been lucky enough to catch a small glimpse at them and what she saw disturbed her.

She saw false happiness and a lot of wisdom in them. She also saw something underneath those two blaring emotions…

…loneliness.

His eyes held a great sadness only achievable when someone was forced to grow up too fast. And had she not been an actress and used to faking emotions, she might have missed the happiness being faked.

But loneliness was one thing that was impossible to fake and, had she not know what to look for from her own experience, she would have passed it off at how well he had it covered up.

Overall she figured his life must have been pretty bad for him to have enough practice at hiding what he truly felt.

She was surprised that Kakashi had not noticed it because she had seen a lot of the same emotions to a much minor degree.

She only hoped that he had not noticed his student's plight and was not simply ignoring it.

She quickly pushed that thought back, surely if Kakashi knew he would try to fix the problem.

But, that still did not explain how such a young man of fourteen had already felt so alone that his eyes almost pleaded for someone, anyone, to pull him out of the same abyss he had unknowingly pulled her out of.

She was only two years older and, from his eyes, she could tell that he had already endured much more than she or any other human should have to over their entire lifetime.

And she doubted that if left alone much longer he would be able to free himself from the grasp loneliness had on his soul.

She let her mind wonder and wished there was something she could do to help him escape the stranglehold he was in.

She went through many ideas but all seemed temporary and would not help him enough in the long run.

Just as she was about to give up for tonight, she got an idea that would most likely help him out now and in the future.

Getting up from the bed, she walked over to her door and opened it before calling one of the servants that stayed after her uncle was ousted.

When the servant arrived, she gave her a quick message before she retreated into her room and went to one of the designs on the wall.

She took the letter opener she got from her nightstand and made a small slit on her thumb before putting a little blood on each finger and put her hand right in the middle of the design.

She saw the design covering her objective start to swirl and she started to add a little bit of chakra to dispel the minor Genjutsu covering up the blood seal.

While she might not be a ninja, her father had shown her a little trick with chakra when she was little and she had unlocked her chakra just for the purpose of doing the same thing as him.

It was fairly simple trick and she found that doing it relaxed her somewhat when she was traveling around.

All it took was swirling your chakra in a direction while something was in your hand and the result was the object being spun by the chakra.

The faster you spun the chakra the faster the object spun and it mesmerized her how something so easy could be so fascinating.

Due to her small amount of experience with chakra, she could do simple things like open up a blood seal or remove something from a storage scroll.

Even if she did not have enough chakra to be considered a ninja, the skills that she knew required very little chakra and were very useful when sending and receiving important documents or keeping private things private.

She unlocked the safe and carefully pulled out a small ornate box.

Inside the box there were a few artifacts worth more than anything in Spring country and Fire country combined and she planned on giving one of them to Naruto

She was lucky that while her uncle knew where the true 'treasure' of spring country and the 'legacy' of the Kazahana clan was, she was the only one that could open the seal as the blood had to be an exact match or the person who tried to open it died a very slow and painful death.

She hoped that Naruto would accept her gift and maybe she could get him to open up for her. It was the least she could do for him after all he had done for her and her home.

-0-0-0-0-

Naruto was resting on the thin futon in the room that he and Sasuke shared.

The servants that were still working at the mansion Koyuli had reclaimed were kind enough to lend him one for the duration of their mission in the former country of Snow.

He honestly did not know why Kakashi had made them share the room with one bed with when Sakura and Kakashi's own room both had two beds.

He could not help but hear the little voice in the back of his head that said Kakashi hated him along with everyone else in Konoha and, after a few events that had taken place recently, it was getting harder for him to ignore the voice.

Sure he had never been physically abused, unless the whips he got with a belt instead of a spanking when he got in to trouble at the orphanage counted.

But the feeling of being alone, of going home to an empty apartment that barely counted as a home after a hard day of training was more than enough to make up for it.

So, at the age of five, he had put up a mask to try and cope with the void he was left in.

He would be damned before his abusers got to see the effects of their handiwork.

There really was no one for him to rely on in those early years and even now he only had Ero-sennin, Baa-chan, and Shizune but even they were busy and had very little time for him.

Not to mention he did not want to bother them with his problems with their own lives.

Jiraiya trying, key word trying, to get some young woman to model for his smutty book.

Baa-chan was getting herself acquainted with her new position and Shizune was there alongside the revered medic to make sure she did not just get drunk and shirk her duties off on some pour soul.

He briefly wondered what it would be like to have someone there for him when he needed it most.

Sure the Sandaime was there for him every now and then when he was alive, but he had his duties that he could not push off onto other people and Naruto often got the short end of the stick.

And while he may trust Iruka a little, he still remembers the cold glares he received from the man not too long ago, and that kept him from opening up to the teacher.

And looking at how some of the other Genin teams acted like family, he examined his own relationship with his team.

Kakashi was a lazy, perverted, apathetic, asshole that ignored him for his two teammates who either showed no inclination to become better or expected power to be given not earned.

Sakura was a fangirl plain and simple.

She followed Sasuke around like a pathetic puppy and was an overall waste of space.

By all rights after all the high ranking missions they had, she should have either wised up, been kicked out of the program, or, in a worst case scenario, be dead.

But she was not because Sasuke and he had saved her ass so many times it was no longer funny.

His other teammate might not have been a waste of space but he was the most unstable person on the team.

Sure he might not exactly sane himself but he does not go berserk at the first sighting of someone who had harmed him in a physical or mental way.

If he did, he had no doubt in his mind Konoha would be nothing but a ghost town by now as almost every person in the village had at least sent him a cold glare.

As he was about to fall even deeper into despair, a knock came from the door.

He had left the dining room shortly after Koyuki had left and went to his room to try and wrap his head around the things that were troubling him, so he was the only one able to answer the door.

He got up and put up his mask as he opened the door.

Behind the door was a servant that had been sent by Koyuki to inform him of a request to see Koyuki-hime in her chambers as soon as possible.

He nodded and received the directions and set out to see what the princess wanted from him.

If nothing else, he was glad that he would have something to keep his mind from the darker thoughts he constantly repressed.

-0-0-0-0-

Koyuki had been sitting on her bed for what seemed like forever when a tentative knock came from her door.

"Who is it?" she said, trying to verify it was who she wanted to see.

"It's me, Naruto. You had a servant ask me to come see you." sounded his slightly muffled voice.

She smiled a small smile, "Yes you can come in Naruto-kun."

He opened the door and slowly walked inside taking in the sight of her room.

It was plain, but it could as be described as elegantly tasteful.

It also was not furnished with the most expensive things, but it certainly was not composed of second rate furniture.

The walls were a light tan with a few dark brown designs painted on the walls and on one wall he could see a small safe that he assumed protested something valuable.

After he finished taking in the room, Naruto turned his attention to the lady who was sitting on the full size bed.

"What did you need me for, Koyuki-hime?"

She let the small smile fade and Naruto was about to apologize when she spoke up.

"Please do not be so formal Naruto-kun."

He gave her a smile before nodding his assent.

Her smile returned as she motioned for him to sit next to her.

He slowly walked to the bed before sitting on the edge like she was and noticed how soft the bed felt.

He idly wondered if this was the same kind of bed Kakashi and the res got to sleep on every night they had been here.

He quickly crushed that line of thought.

It would not due for him to lose control of his mask and start angsting to the level only normally accomplishable by an Uchiha.

Once he was seated, she took a deep breath to steady her nerves before beginning.

"There are a few reasons why I asked for you to come. The first of which is contained in this box."

He saw her hold up an ornate box.

It was about the size of his shuriken holster and was decorated in different designs but was really odd was the lid.

It had six different gems with a different Kanji engraved in a space above them.

"Inside this box is contained the legacy of the Kazahana clan. It also has to do with an old legend That I would like to tell you."

Naruto slowly nodded his head, the only thing he liked book wise was legends and myths and he had read all the ones in Konoha's general Library and he was eager to hear another.

Koyuki smiled again and began "About three hundred years ago a young man by the name of Kazahana Jin, a ronin samurai, was asked to perform a task by an old lady who had no money to pay him with.

"Even knowing that she had no money to pay him with, he preformed the task and instead of asking and he even gave her all the loot he collected from the bandits that had been raiding farms in the area and killed her husband along with several other defenseless persons.

"What Jin did not know was that the old woman was actually an angel sent down to find a person worthy enough to receive a gift from the gods.

"After seeing Jin's lack of arrogance and his willingness to help out of the kindness of his heart, the angel suggested Jin to receive their gift.

"The gods agreed and the angel returned baring these," here she opened the box and revealed to be six round stones. They were smooth and looked to be carefully polished.

"Jin was confused when the old woman offered them to him and initially refused to accept them but, he took them anyways as she insisted that they would bring him good luck and she could not expect him to have done her request for free.

"As he was admiring them, he felt drawn to one of the stones and he decided to always keep the stone on his person.

"A week later Jin came to a village that was being terrorized by a warlord.

"Seeing that they were defenseless against the tyrant, Jin took up arms against them the next time they tried to raid the town.

"He cut through the thousand men sent to the town before he reached the warlord himself.

"The warlord was as good as Jin was when he had not been fighting for the past hours against the lords thousand soldiers.

"Eventually the warlord had Jin on his knees and was about to kill him when the good luck charm he received from the old woman stated to grow a bright red before bursting into flames.

"The warlord was shocked by what happened, and he was barely able to jump back from the explosion before he was burned to ashes.

"The warlord looked into the flames after he recovered only to see Jin walking out of the fire unharmed, but that was not the only thing he noticed.

"Jin now had on red armor with two katanas strapped to his back. Without saying a word Jin drew the katanas and put them together at the end of each handle making one long double bladed sword.

"Before the warlord knew what was going on, Jin had jumped into the air and twirled his weapon before shouting something that the warlord could not hear.

"When Jin woke up, he was dressed in the red armor and in front of him ran a trench about a mile long and a mile deep.

"Jin decided to go talk to the old woman and see what the stones really were.

"Upon arriving he was welcomed kindly by the woman.

"When he brought up the armor and the stones and she only got a small smile on her face before she left the world in a flash of light.

"Twenty years later Jin was training his son Shin in the way of the samurai when Shin accidentally found the box of stones given to Jin by the old lady.

"Shin also felt drawn to one and he took it and kept it with him at all times.

"Five years later Jin was dying due to a disease and he entrusted the box to his son Shin. Shin gratefully accepted the responsibility and continued his ways of helping people.

"Shin eventually settled down in a small fishing village where he met and married a young woman.

"A year after their marriage, a great beast attacked the town from the water that the town had depended on for its livelihood.

"Against his wife's wishes, Shin was on the first boat to try and push the beast back.

"As soon as they got within fifteen feet of the monster, it sunk their boat.

"Shin was the only survivor and he was barely holding on when he felt a surge of energy flow throughout his body and he suddenly felt at one with the sea.

"He woke up a week later in his house being tended to by his wife who told him the monster was killed by a giant tidal wave that came from out of nowhere .

"He slowly reached iout to the nightstand beside himself and grabbed th stone he had taken so long ago only for it to merge with his hand and him to be wearing a blue armored fighting suit.

"As he looked himself over he remembered vaguely what happened.

"He remembere feeling at one with the sea before releasing the energy he had felt earlier and blacked out.

"When his son Rikou turned of age he showed him the five stones that he was not using and Rikou like his father and his father's father found a stone that he seemed drawn to.

"Ever since then it became tradition for the Kazahana heir to look over the stones and see if any of them react with the individual.

"This tradition was continued until my father wanted to try and make peace and not war and decided to not to look over the stones.

"I am actually the first ever female heiress in the Kazahana's clan history and, out of the six stones, only four have chosen to be wielded."

Naruto was staring in awe at the stones as his mind was beginning to try and figure out why she was telling him this, and as if reading his mind she continued.

"It has never been tried before but, I wanted to see if one of the armors accepted you as their user."

Seeing him already trying to protest she held up her hand. "Before you try to dissuade me, let me give you my reasoning."

She saw him relax slightly and she took a small breath before continuing.

"You have something that many people lack these days… a pure outlook.

"You are not afraid to fight when you have to but you also try to avoid fighting unless you find it absolutely necessary."

She glanced at him once again before finishing her reasons.

"And your nindo is along the same lines as the Kazahana clan's motto of 'Protect those special and those weaker then yourself and never back down'. So I feel if anyone is going to use it properly it will be you."

Naruto was so overwhelmed by different emotions that he could only nod his assent.

Koyuki carefully gave him the box in for him to look over and he examined each stone carefully.

Naruto was about to call it quits when he saw a small flash on one of the stones. He looked at it a few more seconds and was about to tell Koyuki that none were reacting when he saw the same stone flash with the Kanji for 'justice'.

He slowly reached out and picked it up and admired its smooth flawless beauty when he saw the Kanji flash again and this time he knew for certain that's what he was looking for.

While Naruto was examining the stone up close, Koyuki saw a flash from one of the other stones in the box.

Curiosity getting the better of her, she slowly reached out and grabbed the stone.

She saw the flash again and identified it as the Kanji for 'Life' when it flashed once more, and she was slowly becoming enthralled by the stones rapidly flashing kanji.

She was broken out of her trance when she heard Naruto speak.

"Koyuki-chan, I think this one is reacting to me."

She looked over to him before she took the box back and almost put the one she had taken out back but, decided against it and closed it up before returning the four remaining stones to their hiding place and replacing the blood seal.

After she was done, she turned around to see Naruto still slowly examining his stone. She cleared her throat to regain his attention.

He stopped examining his stone to look at Koyuki.

"One of the other things I wanted to talk to you about is this."

As she finished her sentence, she quickly walked over to Naruto before grabbing his cheeks softly and leaning in and planting a soft kiss on his lips.

Naruto sat there stunned as a princess gave him his first kiss… well second but he had firmly pushed back Sasuke and his accidental kiss to the deepest part of his mind and put it under lock and key a long time ago.

After a few seconds, he started to respond which made Koyuki unexpectedly groan in appreciation as those feeling she had gotten earlier seemed to come back even stronger.

A minute later they stopped and Naruto's mind tried to catch up with the situation.

First, an heiress to a royal clan in Spring country offers him a priceless artifact.

And now said heiress had just kissed him.

Warning bells were going off in his head that she probably had an ulterior motive.

"Koyuki-chan what wa-umph"

His sentence was stopped soon after it started when she kissed him again.

When she had kissed him the first time, she had no clue what to expect.

But the feeling of her body being on fire and the feeling that she got from being around him increasing tenfold was not an unwelcomed feeling.

And after a few minutes of relishing in the feeling this simple, yet complex, action caused, she let it end far too quickly and wished that she had kept her lips on his.

So, when he opened his mouth to say something she jumped the chance and kissed him again.

This time though, she pushed her tongue into his already open mouth.

Koyuki was even more surprised when the feelings from the first kiss returned with a vengeance as she tried to coax him into reciprocating her actions and, after a few seconds, he started to move his tongue against her tongue clumsily but his enthusiasm more than made up for his inexperience.

Truth be told, she only had experience because of her movies but he was learning quickly.

A few minutes later Koyuki pulled back and looked curiously at Naruto who was still trying to pull himself together.

When he finally did, he had a few questions but he choose the one he felt needed to be answered the most.

"Why?"

She gave him a smile before speaking.

"First, I wanted to thank you for all you did for me properly."

Naruto gave her a look that basically said that he did not quite believe her.

"And the other reason?"

She blushed slightly before responding.

"I feel safe around you.

"You're the first person that I feel safe around since father was killed."

Naruto slowly nodded his head as he took what she said in but what she said next threw him for a loop.

"And I can tell you don't have many, if any, people that you can talk to if you had the need to.

"And since you helped me, I wanted to do something to help you and I kind of hoped you would let me help you with your problems."

When she finished she looked away and Naruto was still trying to register what she had said when she spoke again.

"Before I met you I felt as if I was alone and no one knew what I was going through but, you showed up and slowly started to chip away at the icy exterior I put up and eventually you broke through and let me know what it was like to care for something again."

Naruto was off in his own world as he listened to her talk.

He had always felt that he was alone and that no one else could understand what was going on.

She's just like mehe commented in his own mind as he sat stone stiff with tears leaking down his eyes.

He finally could not hold it in anymore when Koyuki pulled him into a hug and he broke down and cried for the first time in almost nine years.

He cried and, at Koyuki insistence, he told her everything…

…about his empty apartment…

…about the glares…

…about Kyuubi…

…about his yearning to know if his parents had loved him…

…about his life in general…

And eventually he passed out in her arms with a smile on his face as someone was holding him for the first time in his life.

Someone cared and even went as far as to try and help him get through what ever problems he had and, as he lost consciousness, felt himself being pulled from a void he had been in all his life.

Seeing no reason to wake the young man, Koyuki set him down softly on the bed before turning out the lights and joining him even if her mind was swirling over all that she had just heard and she doubted that sleep would come for her quickly if at all.

As Koyuki lay awake in bed holding a peacefully sleeping Naruto in her embrace, her mind began to try and work out a way to help alleviate some of his problems on a more permanent basis.

She knew that the root of all his problems stemmed from Kyuubi but she could do nothing about it and let her mind shift to another big source of enmity for the blond…

…Konoha.

Konoha hated him for something h had no control over even going as far as to ostracize him for his burden.

Forgetting her dilemma for a few minutes, she just pulled him in tighter and relished in the feelings that could only be described as a warm and comforting coursed through her as she breathed in his scent.

After a few minutes cold hard logic decided to seep back into her thoughts and snapped her head out of its slightly dazed state.

If things continued the way they were, Naruto might need to be able to get out of Konoha soon as most of his problems had some root in Konoha and, from what she could tell, the Godaime, her assistant and this Ero-Sennin he kept talking about were the only people who have never held any malice for him.

And she also knew from the night's little talk that the only reason he even stayed in Konoha when he was younger was for the Sandaime Hokage.

But, since the Sandaime's death, Naruto had been focusing on all the negative parts of Konoha he had overlooked to keep his 'Oji-san' happy by staying in Konoha.

She racked her brain on different ways that she could get him out of his own personal hell without resorting to drastic actions.

There were couple ways she had already thought of for him to legally escape Konoha, but the easiest and most plausible way was by her becoming the daimyo and formally requesting him to be one of her royal guard.

But there was another way that was almost as assured to get him out.

Since he now owned a piece of the Kazahana treasure, she could technically request him to be her personal clan body guard.

Most heirs and leaders of the Kazahana clan did have a guard that they had usually known since childhood.

For example, her father's guard, Shinji-san, was his best friend growing up and used to watch her when her father had something important to do and could not watch her himself.

But even if she requested him to be her guard there was no guarantee that the Hokage would let Naruto be the guard unlike if she asked him to become her royal guard where Konoha had no choice but to comply or risk a shaky alliance with a highly advanced country.

But the advantages for her requesting him to be her clan guard were that they did not have to stay in Spring country.

Her clan may have settled in Spring country but the clan laws stated that the head of clan could travel as they pleased as long as they did not cause trouble for Spring.

Him leaving the confines of Konoha and seeing the rest of the world would do him a lot of good and would ultimately accomplish a couple of her own agendas.

She would get to figure out what these weird feelings she felt around him and would keep her with him where she could be there for him in his most desperate hours.

She honestly had no idea why she desired him not to be so lonely but she passed it off quickly not wanting to deal with this situation as she was starting to feel sleepy.

She felt her eyelids start to close and she resigned herself to speak with Naruto about what he wanted in the morning.


	2. Beginning of a New Future

**I Don't Own Naruto.**

**AN1: I am very busy so I won't Usually have time to respond to reviews. Sorry.**

**AN2: I am changeing the way the elements weakneses and strengths work**

**Fire is fanned by Wind, Wind destroys Earth, Earth absorbs Lightning, Lightning electrifies Water, and Water puts out Fire. **

Ronin

Beginning of a new future

Tsunade could feel a headache coming on.

Team 7 had just returned from their A turned S rank mission to the country formerly known as Snow country .

Koyuki had came with them claiming that she had something to speak with the Hokage about and that she had to do it herself.

Because of their extra member, it took a week to arrive back in Konoha and the first thing they did was report to the Hokage tower and had just finished their report three hours after arriving.

" Are there any injuries to report, Kakashi?"

Kakashi looked up from his book with his patented lazy look plastered on his face.

"No Hokage-sama, the most injured any of us ever were was a few deep scratches here and there, nothing major to report."

She sighed in relief until she saw Naruto flinch and Koyuki look at Kakashi in decently veiled disgust.

She pushed a few dark thoughts out of her head.

She would just give Naruto a physical and check over his health sometime next week.

"Team 7, you are dismissed. Kakashi, I expect a report on my desk first thing after the two day standard recovery time."

Kakashi nodded before using shunshin to leave while Sakura and Sasuke left the conventional way, the former following the latter like a lost puppy.

Tsunade turned her gaze on Naruto who had not been meeting her eyes anytime during the debriefing and had failed to leave with his team.

"That included you too Naruto. I need to speak with Koyuki-hime in private."

As he opened him mouth to respond, he was cut off by said princess.

"Actually Hokage-sama, my main reason for coming to talk to you involves Naruto, so I believe it would be prudent for him to be in attendance."

Tsunade let out another sigh, she could already tell that this meeting was going to be, for lack of a more appropriate word, troublesome.

"If that's the case Koyuki -hime, please, let us begin with this discussion.

"We have, after all, all had a long morning and I'm sure we all want to get out of this stuffy office and relax for the rest of the day."

Koyuki took this as a sign to start and she took a moment to collect all her stray thoughts.

"As you know from Kakashi-san's report, I have refused to take up the position of Daimyo for the new country of Spring.

"Instead I relinquished that right to one of my father's most trusted advisors, which returned when he heard the news of my corrupt uncle's downfall.

"And while I want to help my home country, too much has happened for me to stay there for any extended periods of time.

"As such, I have enacted my clan head status of the Kazahana clan and received the right to travel anywhere I please under diplomatic immunity, granted that I do not abuse these powers.

"As such, I will be acting as a 'go-between' for Spring and her new allies while I travel the world like I did before being tricked back to my home country.

"But because of my new status, I will need a bodyguard and for that I am humbly asking for you to void Uzumaki Naruto's affiliation with the village of Konoha with the promise of him never revealing any of her secrets and allow him to become my guardian."

Tsunade sat back getting a contemplative look on her face. There was one question that was on the top of her mind and from the way Naruto did not seem surprised in the least verified that her assumption was most likely right.

"Am I to assume that you have talked to Naruto about this."

Instead of letting Koyuki answer this time, Naruto spoke up.

"During the mission, Koyuki and I… talked about some parts of our less than fortunate pasts.

" I told her about Kyuubi and some other things that had been weighing on my mind for quite some time."

Tsunade gained wide eyes as she heard this. From the little she actually knew about the blond before she arrived was that the subject of the Kyuubi was something he tried to avoid if possible, even around the Sandaime who was like his grandfather.

In order for him to have talked about this subject something big must have happened during the mission.

But as far as she could tell from Kakashi's report nothing unreasonably major for overthrowing a leader of a country had happened on the mission.

If his report proved to be faulty, she did not know quite what she would do to him… yet.

She did not have time to ponder her thoughts any longer as he continued his part of the story.

"After our heart to heart I fell asleep in her room from extreme mental exhaustion and apparently, while I was asleep, Koyuki came up with several possibilities to help my problems."

He looked out her window to the Hokage Mountain in the distance, looking over the faces of the previous leaders his eyes landing mostly on the third Hokage.

"As it is, the Sandaime Hokage is the only reason I stayed and became a shinobi instead of leaving the village at a young age and, since his death, I have been feeling the effects of all the hatred I receive ten times harder.

"And when Koyuki offered me this position I jumped at the chance to live a life without scorn and accepted her offer."

Tsunade leveled a calculative gaze on the young woman in the room before leaning forward and resting her chin on her fists.

"Why, if I may be so bold as to ask, do you want me to give up one of my most promising shinobi?

"As you no doubt know, because of my foolish teammate's ambition, Konoha has recently lost many of our shinobi and we need every one we can spare at the moment."

It did not take Koyuki any time to respond to the Godaime's question.

In truth she was expecting it and had already thought of an explanation beforehand.

"There are several reasons that I would like for Naruto-kun to become my bodyguard.

"The most important being that he is the only person I have felt comfortable around in ages not to mention the fact that it would do him good to be out of Konoha and 'live a life without glares' as Naruto put it.

"And there is one more thing…"

She seemed to hesitate slightly before Naruto put his hand on her shoulder as an obvious sign that she was doing great.

She flashed him a small, grateful, smile before continuing her reasoning of why Naruto should be her bodyguard.

"For all that Naruto did for me personally, I decided to reward Naruto in my own special way and the way I chose involved a family heirloom.

" The Kazahana clan is an old clan from back when the samurai were the only form of warrior and chakra had not even been discovered yet.

"During that time, our patriarch received six mystical armors blessed by the gods themselves.

"The armors were stored inside six different stones and each heir has carried a stone up until my father.

"The armor chooses who gets to wear it and I decided that to help further Naruto's abilities and such that seeing if one of the armors would react would make a great reward for him.

"I had him observe the stones and he found one that reacted to him."

Tsunade saw Naruto reach into his pocket and pulled out a smooth silver stone and show her as proof that Koyuki was not lying.

"I gave this to him as a way to repay him for what he did for me and I did it with no strings attached.

"As this armor is one of the Kazahana clan's greatest secrets and strengths, I could would have easily been justified in making Naruto a member of the Kazahana clan and then you could not have refused to release him from duty without cutting all diplomatic ties with Spring country."

Tsunade let the full implications of what Koyuki was over her.

The princess had her backed into a corner with seemingly no other option but to let Naruto go or have Koyuki declare him a part of the Kazahana clan and be taken like that.

Tsunade had to admit it was a decent plan and one with no glaring weak points to exploit on her end but lots of loopholes for Koyuki to use against her.

Had this been any other time she would praise the young woman for trapping her so marvelously.

But with Akatsuki out there and several other enemies that could go after him, she would not be complimenting Koyuki's political tact any time soon because if she agreed right now she might just be sending him to his death without the protection a village offered.

The only way for her to agree with this decision was if she knew for a fact that the blond she had come to see as a little brother was strong enough to survive with his enemies after his tail.

And she had just the way to make sure Naruto was strong enough for her to be able to sleep easy at night.

"How about we negotiate Koyuki-hime, in a month Jiraiya had planned on taking Naruto on a training trip.

"What I propose happens is that you go with them and at the end of the training trip we will test Naruto and, should he prove strong enough, Naruto will be released from his duties as an unbound ninja with emotional ties to Konoha."

Koyuki glanced at Naruto and saw him give a small nod indicating that he understood what had to be done and that he accepted the Hokage's terms.

She also gave a nod towards the Hokage.

If Naruto was happy with the deal then so was she.

"That would be acceptable Hokage-sama, though I do request that Naruto be my guide during my month long stay in Konoha."

Tsunade nodded that was a reasonable request for Koyuki to make and she turned her attention to the blond that was able to look her in the eye again..

"Uzumaki Naruto for the next month you will be on an A-rank mission to escort Koyuki-hime around Konoha.

"Once this month is up you will then escort her while being trained by Jiraiya, the Gama-sennin.

"After your training is complete, if you can hold your own in a fight against me for ten minutes I will allow you to become Koyuki-hime's guard indefinitely and release you from all responsibilities to Konoha.

"Do you accept these conditions?"

He gave her a rare true smile before replying.

"Hai Tsunade-ba-er Hokage-sama, I accept all the conditions of this agreement."

Tsunade smiled a sad smile.

She had purposefully set his goal high so he could have something to try and achieve.

After the fiasco with her losing her bet with him in regards to the Rasengan, she had pieced together that if you give him an almost impossible goal, he will achieve it and then some in the allotted time.

"Dismissed. If I need you for anything I will send you a message."

Naruto nodded before turning and holding the door for Koyuki as they exited the office.

As soon as they left the room Tsunade let a small smile grace her face.

The way they acted around each other reminded her of how Dan and her had acted when he was still alive and what made it even more amusing was the fact that they did not seem to notice that they acted like a couple.

She pushed that thought out of her head before she started filling out the surprisingly small amount of paperwork there was today.

-0-0-0-0-

It was already noon before Koyuki and Naruto were finally able to leave the tower.

"Hey Koyuki-chan, Do you want to get something to eat now?"

She got a sly smile on her face before replying.

"Are you asking me on a date Naruto-kun? If so than I accept.

"Just please anywhere but a Ramen stand for lunch."

He grinned sheepishly at that comment before his brain caught up with the first part of her sentence and he blushed brightly.

"S-s-sure Koyuki-chan, I just found this great dango restaurant the day before we left for the mission."

She gave him a small smile and grabbed his hand before telling him to lead the way.

While they walked in a comfortable silence she let her mind wonder to different subjects.

She let out a soft sigh and let herself lean even more into him as they passed the many shops in the market district.

One day she would have to ask someone about the feelings she got around Naruto but for now she was content to get lost in the feeling that was like a warm blanket on a cold day.

She would have kept leaning on his shoulder but they had arrived at the dango restaurant.

They ordered a set of dango each before taking a seat to wait for their food.

While they waited Koyuki had a question that she had wanted to ask him earlier but had not found a good opportunity to do so.

"Naruto-kun can I ask you a question"

"What is it Koyuki-chan?

She fidgeted a little before seeming to regain her nerve and pressing forward.

"Do you think you could teach me how to use my chakra?"

His expression turned sad before he answered her.

"Koyuki-chan, I wish I could but you have to train your chakra from an early age to expand your chakra coils making it impossible for someone past the age of ten to start learning how to manipulate chakra."

He really wanted to help her but that was something that even he could not do.

He got a curious look when Koyuki grabbed a chopstick and put it on her hand before her face scrunched up in slight concentration as it began to spin in the center of her hand.

Naruto just stared wide eyed for a few minutes trying to snap out of his shock at what she had just done.

She had just manipulated chakra to spin the chopstick in a similar fashion to what he initially tried when he started learning the Rasengan

He could not help the surprise that crept into his voice when he responded to her actions.

"Where did you learn that, Koyuki-chan?"

She gave a sad smile and looked to be lost in the past.

Naruto was about to apologize for bringing up bad memories when she snapped out of her reverie and spoke up.

"My father taught me, just like he was taught by his father."

Naruto nodded his head in understanding.

It was common for parents to pass on some if not all their knowledge of a particular subject so their legend can continue on.

Or some bullshit like that, he never really cared as he had no family that he knew of.

"After we eat I'll help you draw out more of your chakra."

She smiled brightly and that smile remained the remainder of their time in the dango stand.

-0-0-0-0-

They arrived at his favorite training ground twenty or so minutes after leaving the dango stand.

He turned to face Koyuki as he spoke

"Alright Koyuki-chan, I want you to put your hands in this seal and try and draw forth your chakra."

After helping her get her fingers in the right position for the ram seal, she started to slowly bring out chakra and it eventually leveled off slightly above Sakura's level.

He always knew the pink haired bimbo had a low amount of chakra, but for a person who had very little knowledge of chakra to have even more than her was disgraceful.

"That's good Koyuki-chan. Do you need to rest before moving on?"

While she might have asked him to help her, he was not going to play the role of slave driver… yet.

He saw Koyuki shake her head in the negative and he saw that she had not even broken a sweat yet.

"I'm going to start you on the same thing Kakashi started us on…"

She leaned forward in anticipation.

Asshole he may be, but Kakashi was not the legendary copy ninja for just any reason.

"You are going to climb trees, without your hands."

She gave him a look that he understood to mean show me or you are going to be in pain soon.

Not wanting to anger her and bring forth the extra strength women tend to have when they get angry, Naruto wisely went to a tree and started to climb it… without using his hands.

Once he got all the way up, he back flipped off the tree and landed right next to Koyuki.

"The trick is to not put too much chakra into your feet or you will blow off, but if you don't put enough… you fall down.

"The way I understand it is like his, think of your chakra like a suction cup not enough suction and you fall off, but I would suggest trying it with a foot to get a feel for the amount of chakra needed to stick to the tree before you attempt to climb it.

"Once you have an idea of the amount of chakra needed, it is actually best to get a running start.

She nodded and walked over to a tree and placed her foot on it and put her hands in the newly learned ram seal.

She seemed to go into a state of semi-consciousness as she tried to draw out the precise amount needed for the exercise.

After a minute of concentration, she slowly lifted her other foot off the ground and put on the tree seeing how to regulate the flow with two feet attached at the same time.

She snapped her eyes open and stepped off the tree before retreating to a decent distance from the said tree.

She put her hands into the seal again and began to concentrate on drawing the correct amount of chakra necessary for her to climb the vertical surface.

Once she felt she had the correct amount she ran towards the tree and when she got there she did not even break stride as she began her ascent into the tree tops.

Once she was at the same height as Naruto she turned around and ran back down the tree.

Once she was back on the ground she sat underneath the tree, panting slightly.

She gave Naruto a tired smile before passing out.

He shook his head in disbelief but he understood why she passed out.

She had, in the space of a day, brought out a large amount, for her, of chakra then used a decent amount getting a feel for the exercise before running up and down the tree with ease.

She had done better than he thought she would and he might have to teach her water walking tomorrow.

He bent down and gingerly picked her up and started to make his way back to his apartment.

When he arrived, he set Koyuki on the bed and tried to get her to let go so he could sleep on the couch.

When he finally gave up after ten minutes of trying to get her hold to relinquish, he crawled into bed next to her and prayed to god she did not kill him when she woke up.

-0-0-0-0-

The next morning had actually been quite calm and Koyuki did not seem to mind him sleeping with her at all.

While she was taking her shower, Naruto prepared a small breakfast of toast and an egg.

When Koyuki came out of the shower, he went to the bathroom to take his shower as well.

After their showers and breakfast, Naruto lead Koyuki towards the area where Jiraiya had taught him the water walking exercise.

Normally he would not have tried to rush her but the sooner she had her reserves built up the faster they could move on to more fascinating subjects.

Arriving at the stream he decided now was as good a time as ever.

"Your next exercise will be to walk on the surface of this stream.

"It is the same concept as the tree walking but it requires more chakra, about double I think.

"This will also increase your reserves faster but the water is cold so try not to fall in."

He looked at her only to see a small blush adorning her face but he could not think of why she would be blushing.

He walked over to the bank and sat down intending to be close in case she needed help.

He watched her concentrate and slowly stepped onto the stream... only to fall right in after her first step.

As he was about to go see if she needed help, he saw her arm grab onto the bank and pulled her soaking wet body out of the stream.

Now Naruto knew why she had the blush earlier.

She had worn white today.

He passed out from an explosive nosebleed as he got an inadvertent view at her barley contained chest in the soaked, skin tight, top.

He did not awaken until a few hours later Koyuki threw him into the middle of the stream while she stood on top of the water.

This time it was Koyuki who passed out because the cold water had shrunk his pants giving her a rough estimate of his size while not aroused.

-0-0-0-0-

The rest of the month passed in a similar fashion and a week before Jiraya was scheduled to arrive, Koyuki had asked to just have a day off to relax from training.

He had initially refused but, when Koyuki looked at him with her 'puppy-pout' face as he dubbed it, he could not resist and agreed with her request.

Over the month they had gone on many 'dates' and Naruto was really wondering why he seemed so at ease with Koyuki.

Koyuki liked to joke around and also understood what it is like to grow up without knowing the love of a parent for most if not all of your life.

From what he heard from Sakura about her crush on Sasuke was that she always felt nervous or anxious that she was not up to his expectations.

He did not feel that way around Koyuki but he also did not quite know exactly what he felt for Koyuki.

He had tried to ask her about what he was to her but each time he lost his nerve and changed his question mid-sentence.

Koyuki had also become addicted to the dango stall he had taken her to the first day and all their dates had taken place at the stand.

Today was no exception and the chatted amicably as they munched on their dango.

After lunch, Naruto agreed to go shopping with her.

Had he known that he was the one being shopped for he might have suggested something else but he had to admit having Koyuki ogle him for hours on end had felt rather nice for some reason.

Once they were done they made a quick stop by the grocery store to pickup something for dinner.

Naruto was pretty distracted so he did not see Koyuki slipping a bottle of Sake in with what they needed.

When they got back to his apartment, Koyuki insisted that she be the one to cook supper while he went and cleaned up

After his shower he was treated to some of Koyuki's heavenly cooking and after dinner was done Koyuki had brought out some saucers and the bottle of sake.

Naruto had originally weary of the drink but he decided what the hell and downed his saucer in one go.

He nearly choked as the sake burned its way down his throat leaving his throat tingly in its wake.

They eventually drained the small jug she had picked and once they were done with it, they were both fairly intoxicated.

As they sat on the couch, Naruto listened as intently as drunken mind could to her stories.

One of the stories must have hit a sore spot because soon after that story was over she was crying her eyes out onto his shoulder.

He could make sense of a little bit of her sobbing story and pieced together that she still had not fully gotten over her father's death all those years ago.

Remembering what she had done for him not to long ago, He just held her and rubbed her back as her rambling slowed down and she passed out from mental exhaustion.

He wobbly carried her to his bed before laying her down and turning to leave only to have his hand grabbed by Koyuki.

She had then pulled him down so that he was laying next to herself as she snuggled up to him before going to sleep with a content smile on her face.

Naruto followed soon after and instinctively pulled her even closer as to shelter her from her problems.

-0-0-0-0-

Naruto was floating in what looked to be a sewer.

It had been two days since Koyuki's drunken Rambling.

The day after they had sat down and talked most of the day about different things but there was an somber undertone to most of their conversations and they usually ended up back in a comfortable silence.

All throughout the day Koyuki had said that she felt something bad was going to happen soon and he had waved it off until Shikamaru came by and informed him that his avenger teammate had left the village.

After reassuring Koyuki that he would be fine on the mission to retrieve him, Shikamaru and he were off gathering the rest of the needed people to complete the mission.

In the end Kiba and Akamaru, Neji, and Choji as well as he were put under the command of Shikamaru to retrieve Sasuke.

His mind turned to dark thoughts when his other 'teamate' came to mind.

The bitch had requested ,in front of all the people about to be sent out, for him to retrieve her 'precious, misguided Sasuke-Kun'.

Had they been alone, he would have refused her request in a heartbeat but, in front of others there was no possible way for him to do it without coming off as a heartless bastard.

And since then everything had gone wrong on the mission.

First Choji had to stay behind and fight someone even bigger and probably stronger in pure strength than the Akamichi, after they had almost all there chakra drained from their bodies.

Then Neji had volunteered to stay and fight the spider-ish person as he was the only person suitable to fight him because of the Jyuken leaving Kiba, Shikamaru, and himself to continue the chase.

A few miles from where they left Neji, Kiba and Akamaru had gotten separated from Shikamaru and him when they accidentally set off a trap, leaving Shikamaru to hold off the redhead while he chased after the pale shinobi who had shown up to take Sasuke the rest of the way to Oto and Orochimaru.

Naruto eventually caught up to the boy in a large clearing and proceeded to try and defeat the light skinned shinobi.

Naruto was lucky that he had practiced his taijutsu so much or he might not have been able to hold him off until Lee had arrived.

The enemy shinobi that had been sent to finish escorting Sasuke was able to use his bones as weapons and was taking out clones left and right until Lee came and evened out the battle field.

But they wasted too much time and Sasuke had broken out of the barrel he had been placed in and took off towards the border of Fire and Rice country.

At Lee's urging he left the spandex clad youth to fight the bone manipulator and eventually he ended up in the Valley of the End where Sasuke was waiting for him.

They had talked a few minutes before mutually deciding that words were not going to solve the situation and had started to fight.

The fight that ensued was a fairly even and they even went as far as clashing Rasegan and Chidori in a duel of high powered jutsu which resulted in them blowing each other back about the same distance

It was not until Sasuke had begun using the cursed seal given to him by Orochimaru did he start to gain the upper hand.

One thing led to another and the last thing Naruto remembered before arriving in the sewer was getting pile driven into the ground from twenty or thirty feet in the air.

He heard the unmistakable sinister voice of the Kyuubi coming from his right side.

**"Pathetic human, you are nothing without my power."**

Naruto let his eyes travel over to the angry kitsune but did not speak.

**"Fine don't beg for my help. Here is some chakra. Just don't embarrass us anymore than you already have been by losing to a lowly Uchiha."**

A wave of red chakra came from behind the seal and began to rush towards Naruto.

As it was about to come into contact with Naruto, an orange barrier surrounded Naruto and began healing him faster than the Kyuubi did and forced the vile chakra back into the cage.

Naruto felt the energy rush through him.

It felt the same as the Kyuubi's did only instead of a vile feeling he felt oddly at peace.

And instead of the constant burning he felt when using the Kyuubi's chakra, he felt as if he was made of stone and that anything the Kyuubi could try to do would not harm him in the slightest.

If anyone could see his forehead right now they would see the kanji for 'Justice' flashing rapidly.

The faster it flashed the greater the power became until it reached its peak and the Kanji solidified on his forehead.

He looked inside the cage, any of the small amount of fear he had for the beast was now gone, and spoke for the first time since arriving.

"I do not need your power kitsune. I will carve my own path using my own power.

"I will use my power to bring my own justice to the world.

"Just remember, one day you will have to face justice for all your wrong doings."

He felt the power surge and he, by instinct, raised his hand and the ground slowly rose covering the cage in a layer of four foot thick earth and stone muffling the great beasts angry roaring.

Naruo paid no head to the kitsune's futile yelling and kept using his new found power to forever divide himself from the great beast.

As soon as the cage was covered he felt the semi-familiar feeling of vertigo and realized he was leaving his mind.

When he fully recovered from the feeling of vertigo, he noticed that he was under water before he felt the same power surge as earlier and he was engulfed in a pure orange light.


	3. To Arms

**A/N: Third installment of the Ronin series and I would also like to remind people of the elemental system change from my last chapter so there is no confusion of why something in this chapter happens.**  


Ronin

To Arms

Sasuke was sure that Naruto was dead.

He had driven him headfirst into a rocky bank not thirty seconds earlier from about twenty feet in the air.

But if that was true, then why was Naruto standing on the surface of the river.

And he was also sure that he was not wearing an armored body suit earlier.

He was snapped out of his thoughts as Naruto just disappeared and reappeared right behind him.

Had he not activated his sharingan the second he saw Naruto standing on the lake, his head would have been crushed by the kick Naruto had thrown at his head.

But Naruto did not stop there and he quickly threw a punch at him that he barely side stepped as he was still recovering from dodging his previous kick.

He watched in morbid awe as the punch connected with a nearby boulder that started to crack and then crumble not five seconds after Naruto punched it.

Sasuke gulped and let the Curse seal start to spread.

If he was going to win, he knew he would have to get serious and this had changed from a good test of his capacity to a fight for his life.

But even with the cursed seal's power, it was extremely hard to keep up with Naruto as he attacked relentlessly.

After a few more minutes of desperate dodging and weaving, everything started to slow down and he was able to see the majority of Naruto's attacks before they happened.

Sasuke was eventually able to catch Naruto off guard and gave him a solid kick to the chest…

…Only for his foot to feel as if he kicked a boulder while Naruto did not even seem affected at all.

Sasuke's eyes widened as Naruto just charged him not even a second after his kick had connected.

The next thing Sasuke knew was the air leaving his lungs forcefully as Naruto delivered a high powered punch to his chest.

He then felt a few ribs crack as he was sent flying back from the force of the attack before suddenly feeling his body imprint itself in the wall on the other side of the Valley of the End.

As he slowly pulled his body out of his impression, he looked at Naruto who was charging him fast.

Desperate, he quickly went through the hand seals for Chidori and charged up his strongest attack.

Once his Chidori was at full power, he took off towards the speeding Naruto and readied to strike his target.

He was barely able to sidestep the punch thrown and he tried to ram the Chidori through Naruto's heart.

Key word is tried.

As his lightning coated fist made contact with Naruto's slightly armored chest, his Chidori quickly died out as if the armor was absorbing the jutsu.

He did not have time to think as Naruto kneed him in the stomach making him cough up a little blood.

Right before Naruto grabbed him by his hair and gave him a solid kick to the chest sending him back to the bank of the river.

Sasuke decided now was the time to test out the limits of his curse seal's new level and let the power engulf him.

Feeling the major spike of vile chakra coming from Sasuke, Naruto decided that now would be a good time to see what this new power he received was as well.

As he came to this decision, his eyes started to shimmer at the amount of power he was building up and the kanji for 'Justice' became visible on his forehead.

He let himself fall into the power he was feeling and his body acted on its own as he used his left hand to grab his right wrist.

His right hand fisted itself as words came unbidden to his lips.

"Armor of Hardrock, Dao Gi!"

And, in a flash of orange light, the power he had been feeling all throughout the fight seemed to increase by a factor of ten maybe even fifteen.

And as the flash died down, he could see a badly deformed Sasuke looking at him in unveiled horror.

Naruto himself felt heavier yet lighter at the same time.

A quick glance at the water he was standing on revealed why Sasuke looked like he was about to shit his pants.

Instead of what he normally had on, he was now outfitted in orange and brown samurai armor that consisted of a chest piece, shoulder and fore arm guards, a helmet, and strapped to his back was a staff of some kind.

Overall, the body emanated a sense of power that was almost palpable.

He slowly reached to his back and grasped his staff and brought it into his view.

He let his eyes travel the metal weapon from the tip of its foot long blade on the top that would be good for slashing to the bottom that had three spikes that would be great for stabbing.

He idle wondered why he felt as if he could fight with the thing, as far as he could remember he had never had any training with a staff or anything besides kunai and shurikan.

But the weapon felt so right in his hands that it was as if he had been using it ever since he was born.

His mental appraisal of his weapon and armor were interrupted when he had to use the staff to block a swipe from the disfigured avenger's new claws.

He batted away the swipe effortlessly then used the small opening to step inside the Uchiha's guard and gave him another swift knee to the stomach.

As he was still recovering, Naruto used his staff like a base ball bat and smacked it against Sasuke's back sending him forward and sinking into the water upon impact.

Without even thinking he dove under the water and, once he was underneath the surface, he was slightly surprised to find that he could still breathe like he was on land.

He pushed that thought out of his head and began to swim towards Sasuke's body that was slowly descending towards the bottom of the lake.

As soon as he reached him, Naruto grabbed his face then gave a harsh knee to the stomach once again forcing the remaining air out of Sasuke's lungs.

Naruto did not stop there though, He grabbed sasuke's head and gave him a head butt busting the skin of his forehead wide open making copious amounts of blood pour into the water.

As Sasuke was still stunned, he took Sasuke by his feet and began to spin, getting faster and faster, before releasing he avenger at a trajectory so that he would break the surface of the lake and land on shore.

After Sasuke was on a one way trip to the surface, Naruto began to swim upwards towards the surface intent on finishing up his beat down of the Uchiha soon.

When he reached the surface, he saw Sasuke standing up shakily and going through the seals he had used earlier for the Chidori. 

Naruto just stood calmly on the bank waiting for Sasuke to let his attack charge up and remained calm as the Uchiha charged him with his most powerful attack.

He felt as if his armor was telling him to trust in it and to follow its lead.

So trust in it he did and, as soon as Sasuke got to within ten feet, Naruto felt his body move on its own as he got into a stance and brought his staff above his head and twirl it around as words seemed to flow out of his mouth on their own accord.

"Iron Rock Crusher!"

Sasuke was able to stop and avoid the main part of the attack that tore up huge hunks of the ground but, he was not able to avoid the torso sized boulders that fell from the canyon wall when his attack reached it.

Naruto watched as the first boulder hit him in the side of the head, laying him out on his back, and he winced when another boulder fell and landed right between his legs crushing whatever dreams he had of ever walking again, much less restoring his clan.

As the attack ended, Naruto fell to his knees.

That last attack had used apparently depleted whatever energy he had left and he could faintly feel the weight of the armor leaving his body as he collapsed the rest of the way to the ground and started to fade in and out of consciousness.

Right before he lost awareness, he felt an energy source similar to that of his armor's coming closer by the second and he felt something familiar underneath its power.

As he finally passed out he only had one name run through his head.

Koyuki-chan

"Maa, maa, Naruto-kun you have really outdone yourself this time."

-0-0-0-0-

"Come on answer the question, Koyuki-hime?"

Ever since Naruto left on the mission to retrieve Sasuke, Tsunade and she had been discussing the newly forged alliance of Spring and Leaf.

In actuality, all the political talk was done the first day, but Tsunade insisted they had more to talk about today.

What she meant by 'more to talk about' was rather mundane topics and questions that had no bearing on their talks yesterday.

Inside her mind, Koyuki knew that Tsunade was using this to shirk her work, but she really did not care.

What she did care about was that whole time that she was at the office, Tsunade had been making rather poorly veiled insinuations about what Naruto and she had done during the month.

But the last question she just could not piece together why she would even ask what she did.

Sure, Naruto and she had been on several 'dates', but that did not mean that Naruto and she was a couple… right?

"Tsunade-sama, I must implore that you tell me why you insist that Naruto and I was a couple?"

Tsunade blinked a couple of times; surely Koyuki understood what it was like to be in love, after all, she had a family for a short time.

If anyone would not know what love felt like, she would have assumed it to be Naruto. 

He had never known what love of any kind felt like, except that of a grandfather thanks to the Sandaime, so, that would make him seem dense to that certain feeling and those related directly to it.

"Surely you know what love feels like Koyuki-hime?"

Tsunade knew she hit a sore point when, Koyuki looked down with a blank look on her face and as she was about to ask a different question to take her mind off of what seemed to be a distressing topic for the young woman, Koyuki spoke up.

"After my father was killed, I blocked most of those memories from my mind and literally made myself a blank slate emotion wise…

…But, ever since Naruto and I had that heart to heart in Spring country and the smaller one a couple days ago, I have been able to see the memories but I feel nothing from them but sadness that I will never see my father again."

Tsunade looked down as well. She had done the same thing when she left Konoha and it was only recently that she was able to actually look back at all her memories of Dan and Nawaki without bitterness or regret leaking into her thoughts.

For a long time she had been a lot like Koyuki described.

When she was in self exile, she could spend all day thinking about them and never feel any of the good feelings that she had when they were still around.

It was not until she had come back to Konoha after meeting Naruto did she remember what it felt like to love and to be loved back.

She loved Naruto like a son or a sister… a really old sister, but a sister none the less and he seemed to genuinely love her in the same way.

Because of this love, Naruto had helped her regain her happiness but Koyuki… she is not so lucky.

Being a world class medic-nin had its perks, especially the amount of knowledge one had to have of the human brain and body.

Because Koyuki's trauma happened so long ago and she was so young when it happened, Tsunade knew Koyuki had little or no chance to feel anything but sadness from the past because her mind has 'lost' the good part of those memories over time.

"Koyuki-hime, if I may be so bold as to ask, what do you feel when you are around Naruto?"

Koyuki let a smile grace her face and her eyes immediately lost any of the sadness they had in them before.

"When I am around Naruto, I feel as if nothing else is important as long as he stays close and I also feel that, with his support, I could do anything."

Tsunade leaned back in her chair a hazy look in her eyes.

That was extremely similar to how she had felt around Dan all those years ago and she had no doubt that Koyuki was being sincere in her comments.

"A long time ago I felt that same way."

Koyuki looked towards the Godaime with eyes almost pleading to enlighten her to what the feeling was.

"A little over twenty-five years ago I was engaged to be married; anytime I was near him I felt exactly as you described."

Koyuki would not normally have pushed for details, but she was at a loss for her situation and needed answers.

"What happened to him, Tsunade-sama?"

Tsunade got a distant look in her eyes as she responded to Koyuki's prompt.

"A week before we were set to be married, our Jounin squad got an emergency deployment call and on our way back, about an hour from Konoha, we were attacked by a group of nukenins.

"We were able to take care of them easily but Dan… He saved my life by sacrificing his own.

"One of the nins was able to manage one final attack and launched a poisoned Kunai at me.

"I was taking care of a couple minor injuries at the time and did not see it but Dan did.

"He pushed me out of its path and took it to the kidney.

"Had we been a little closer to Konoha, I would have had about a twenty-two percent chance to save him, but as it was, I had less than one percent chance while on the battle field.

"Dan had been there for me when my little brother died and without him the world was so bleak, so I packed my bags and left Konoha indefinably."

By the end of the story Tsunade was letting out small tears of sadness and Koyuki had no idea how to respond to that.

She stood up to try and do something to comfort her when she, all of a sudden, got a dizzy sensation and fell to the ground.

The last image Koyuki had was the Godaime rushing towards her before she blacked out.

-0-0-0-0-

As Koyuki opened her eyes, all she could see was decaying yellow bricks.

She slowly stood up from the ground and took a quick glance around the area.

She was able to conclude that where she was looked a lot like a sewer with a maze of tunnels that seem to crisscross at all kind of weird angles and even had the distinctive smell of one.

She, however, was drawn to a specific hallway and, as she walked down it, she could feel a familiar presence being stifled by a malicious power that felt so strong from where she was that it made her want to curl up in a corner and die.

But the familiar presence kept her pushing forward and she was finally able to see the source of the oppressive power in the air.

Behind a huge gate was the Kyuubi and floating in the water below was Naruto who looked rather beat up.

She tried to run to Naruto and do whatever she could help him in any way but she was stopped by a deep blue barrier.

She watched on, with helplessness eating at her heart, at the scene, hoping against all odds nothing bad happened.

If she had been scared of the fox when she saw it, she was terrified of it now as it spoke.

**"Pathetic human, you are noting without my power."**

Koyuki wanted nothing more than to tell Naruto that it was not true and that he was plenty strong without the foxes help, the barrier keeping her out of the room held strong even under her pounding fists.

**"Fine, Don't beg for my help. Here is some chakra. Just don't embarrass us any more than you already have by losing to a lowly Uchiha."**

She could only watch as a wave of red chakra rushed towards Naruto, only to be stopped by an orange barrier and she could also see his wounds healing rapidly as the orange light intensified.

She could tell that his lips were moving, but she could not make out the words and he was too far to hear.

And all of a sudden, Naruto raised his right hand and a wall of earth started to rise to cover the kitsune's cage effectively cutting hi off from the rest of Naruto's mind.

She watched as an orange flash filed the room and, before she knew what had happened, she found her self back in the Hokage's office with a panicking Godaime over her.

Kouki did not know why she got to see the meeting between the kitsune and Naruto, but there was something she subconsciously knew… Naruto needed her help.

She felt a strange energy start to flow through her and she sat up and tried to leave the office, only to be held back by the Hokage.

She was determined not to let the shinobi holding her back stop her, she would not have Naruto's injuries or possibly even his death weigh on her conscious. 

Unknowingly to Tsunade or Koyuki, the Kanji for 'life' had been flashing rapidly on her brow throughout the entire ordeal and, as she made her decision to help Naruto at all costs, it had solidified and her eyes had gained a deep blue tint to their usual brown.

Her body moved by itself as her left arm slowly reached for her right wrist as if it had a mind of its own.

Even with the grasp Tsunade had on her, Koyuki was able to strengthen her muscles enough with chakra to make them connect and, when they did, she felt a huge burst of energy as she unknowingly uttered one phrase that would be permanently etched into Tsunade's mind for a long time.

"Armor of Strata! Dao Inochi!"

All koyuki could see was an inky blackness before she saw several scrolls rolldown from the seemingly endless sky.

She had no time to think as all the scrolls gained a pink glow before transforming into sakura petals.

She continued to let her body move on its own as she felt the petals start to swirl around her legs and slowly moved up her body and where the petals had been previously now had a comfortable weight on it.

When she was finally able to move her body, she used the distraction she had created to easily break the Godaime's hold.

She then rushed to the window and hurriedly jumped out it to the street below only to stop midway as she felt the power she had been feeling surround her in a bubble and she commanded it to go towards where she could feel Naruto's power growing rapidly.

Back in the office, Tsunade immediately cursed and ran to the window only to see Koyuki stop halfway and be incased in a blue bubble and take off in a hurry.

"Shizune watch the office, I have something I need to do!"

And with that she jumped out the window as well and took off at speeds most people not ranked Jounin would have a hard time seeing.

Tsunade moved as fast as she could, trying to keep Koyuki in her sights.

She did not even stop at the gate and merely rushed through them and the guards before taking to the tree tops at top speed in hopes of catching up to the armor clad princess.

She could barely keep up with her target as Koyuki literally used her armor's power to fly through the tree tops.

This continued on for about an hour before Koyuki saw the end of the trees closing fast and, more importantly, felt the last vestiges of what she assumed to be Naruto's power just beyond the tree line.

She also felt Tsunade about fifty or so feet behind her and could tell by the aura she was putting out that she was pissed, scared, and curious all at the same time.

Koyuki new why she was pissed and curious, after all it is not everyday someone unlocks a family heirloom and jumps out of the window four stories in the air, only to stop two stories above the ground and literally fly off in a hurry, but why was she scarred?

She pushed any unnecessary thoughts out of her head as she broke through the clearing to see Naruto passed out on the bank of a river and Sasuke's torso was sticking out from underneath a medium sized boulder and a silver haired person with glasses slowly making his way towards Naruto with a Kunai in hand.

Not liking the feeling she was getting from the person, she instinctively pulled the bow off her back and withdrew an arrow before cutting the power to the bubble that had formed around her to help her get to her destination faster.

-0-0-0-0-

"Maa, maa, Naruto-kun you have really outdone yourself this time.

"Orochimaru-sama will be most displeased to learn that you have crippled his new body.

"But, he would be even angrier at me if I did not attempt to capture you so he could dissect your body to see how your wonderful healing ability or that strange armor works."

The figure then started to slowly walk towards Naruto.

Orochimaru had sent him here to make sure Sasuke arrived in Oto safely and for him to study the power that the curse seal gave to the Uchha avenger.

After all, it would not do for Orochimaru-sama to be stuck in a weak body so he had hidden himself at the Valley of the End to observe what he thought would be an easy victory for Sasuke.

Needless to say, he was fairly shocked to see an even fight until Sasuke managed to find an opportunity to drive the blonds' head into the rocky shore.

He knew that Naruto would survive the drop thanks to Kyuubi but even the fox had its limits and he doubted Naruto would wake up today or possibly tomorrow.

He watched as Naruto got swept into the water because of how close Sasuke had pile driven him to it.

He was about to come out of hiding and finish escorting Sasuke to Oto when Naruto emerged from the water, fully healed and in a strange battle suit.

He then proceeded to watch Sasuke get thoroughly thrashed even after activating his curse seal.

He thought Sasuke might gain the advantage when he used the second level of his curse seal, only to have that idea smashed into pieces when Naruto called out something and was engulfed in an orange light.

Kabuto knew the fight was over the second he saw the armor Naruto armor had on when the light dissipated and began plotting on how to try and lure Naruto to Otogakure so Orochimaru-sama could use him in his grand plan.

He winced when he saw Naruto's last attack and especially the effects it would have on a man and almost laughed with glee when Naruto collapsed thinking he would have an easy target.

He felt a strong chakra signature break through the tree line and looked towards the arrival only to be forced to back flip in fear of a second arrow being fired in the first's shadow.

When he recovered, he looked towards where the arrow had came from only to see a female with a similar armor only in a rich deep blue color land between Naruto and himself with an arrow notched and aimed right at his heart from what he could tell.

After seeing what an armor similar to hers could do with a user who had already fought a hard fight, he decided to cut his losses and slowly maneuvered his body towards Sasuke's broken form.

Orochimaru would be pissed at Sasuke's condition, but he would be even more pissed if he showed up empty handed.

He ever so slightly turned his body so he could see Sasuke, only to curse in his mind when he saw the slug sannin standing between him and the Uchiha.

He had been so distracted by the power the armor Naruto and this girl's put out that he had failed to notice the Godaime's arrival.

Using his head, he tried to think of possible ways out of this situation and cursed internally as he could only think of one very risky way and he was sure it would not work because he knew that Tsunade had lost her fear of blood meaning that she would have no reservations to pound his ass into the ground.

He felt a stabbing pain in his leg and looked down only to see an arrow protruding the center of his knee cap.

He gritted his teeth in pain, he had been so distracted trying to figure a way out of this situation that he had made a rookie mistake…

He took both his eyes off of one of his opponents and now it will cost him.

He mustered the will power to leap to the side a bit to get out of the women in the armor's direct firing lane and cursed when a blinding pain erupted in his knee that had the arrow in it.

The pain was only temporary however as Tsunade used this time to rush behind his exposed back and gave him one of her supercharged punches in the back of the head, knocking him out instantly.

Tsunade watched in satisfaction as Orochimaru's pet became imbbedded in the Shodaime's statue all the way on the other side of the valley.

She turned to get some answers on how Koyuki had awakened her armor and knew exactly where Naruto was, only to see her in a similar state of unconsciousness as Naruto and she had actually passed out over him in a protective manor.

She shook her head as a small smile played on her lips and sighed before creating three Kage Bunshins and had two pickup Koyuki and Naruto as a third went and retrieved what was left of Sasuke before she made her way towards Kabuto.

She felt something off about him and decided to throw caution to the wind and punch him again, only for Kabuto's body to become a shinobi she did not recognize.

She cursed out loud before punching the cliff wall next to her Grandfather's statue.

Kabuto would have been a great person to have in Ibiki's 'fun' rooms as he would have had a decent amount of information of her former teammate's plans.

She let out a sigh of disappointment before running up the cliff face and back towards Konoha.

She knew Shizune would be able to keep any of the Genin alive the only thing that she could not heal or stabilize would have been something of the level of Rock Lee's surgery and even then she would have been able to save his life just that the person would never be a shinobi again.

She really hoped the Mission had not gone that bad and picked up her pace just in case.

-0-0-0-0-

Koyuki groaned as her body protested it moving at the second.

The first thing she noticed was that she was in the sewer again.

She willed her body up and noticed that it was slightly heavier than before.

She looked down into the murky water and immediately spotted the reason why she felt heavier.

On her body was now a deep blue armor that she knew she had never seen anywhere before.

Her eyes widened considerably when her families legend passed through her mind.

Surely this must be one of their heirlooms.

But even with these thoughts going through her head, she still had to wonder why she was here.

It did not take long because she started to feel a pull just like she had the last time she was here.

Seeing how last time turned out fine, she trusted the feeling and followed it through the labyrinth.

After following her gut and passing through many paths, she finally wound up in a mountain range.

She looked around at the scenery while still following her gut until she reached a boulder about nine feet high and twelve feet around

She knew something was off about the boulder because it gave off an ethereal orange glow occasionally.

She then noticed her armor starting to glow a deep blue matching the frequency of the orange glow coming from the boulder.

Koyuki got the feeling that her armor was telling her something and instead of skimming the surface of the power, her power, she let herself be immersed in it totally and drew the Bow off her back.

She then took an arrow and notched it while putting the boulder in her sights.

She let the arrow fly and watched as an orange barrier surrounded the boulder and reflected her arrow away from the boulder it contained.

She notched another arrow determined to find out why her armor had seen fit to lead her to this specific boulder

She drew the arrow back and, as she did, words sprang from her mouth.

"Arrow Shock Wave!"

She released the arrow and watched in unveiled awe as the barrier absorbed the energy leaving the arrow to pierce the boulder.

After waiting a few minutes, she cursed loudly and was about to draw another arrow when the boulder began to split.

As the split began to grow, she could see an orange light shining through the crack and watched as the boulder began to shake.

She watched in morbid curiosity as the light got brighter and brighter before it finally exploded sending fragments of rock everywhere but near her.

Koyuki, who had turned her head to protect her eyes from the intensity of the light earlier, looked back towards what was left of the boulder only to see a person in orange armor standing right in the center of it all.

She felt the weight of her armor leave her and noticed that the person in the orange armor was glowing slightly.

She watched as his armor left him as well to reveal Naruto who was smiling at her widely.

She too smiled widely and ran over to him before pulling him into a hug.

Naruto wrapped her in his arms as well and leaned next to her ear as he whispered.

"I told you I would be fine and I always keep my promises."

---------

**A/N: I have a fic idea for a Naruto/Mikoto story that won't leave me alone so i am going to work on it to give Ideas for this story to refresh and become more vivid.**


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